As the autumn term meanders along, and the postgrads and staff brace themselves for the onslaught of undergrads once more, I suppose that it’s time I updated my poor blog which has been ignored for most of the summer.

I spent the summer rather enjoyably engaged; there was some academic sight-seeing done, a moderate amount of writing managed, and a great deal of reading done (some of which was even academically relevent). I particularly enjoyed Watermelon Nightsby Greg Sarrisand Heir to the Glimmering Worldby Cynthia Ozick (although as always with Ozick, I suspect that I missed some of the humour due to my own inattention)!

In June, whilst in Paris, I went to see where Edith Wharton lived on the Rue de Varenne. Sadly my attempts to take photographs of No 58 were foiled by an apologetic gendarme who informed me that as it’s now an annex of the Prime Minister’s office, photographs could not be permitted. And although I did manage to see the plaque to Wharton on the wall of No 53, my camera had stopped working at that point! Still, it was lovely to be able to walk the streets in which the end scenes of The Age of Innocence are set, with the dome of the Hotel des Invalides glinting in the background.

Back in Cork, I set about finalising my up-grade from PhD (Track) status to fully fledged PhD candidate, which was rather over-due by that point. However, I can happily state that all is as it should be now, and I can enter into my 3rd year next month without the upgrade hanging around my neck.

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About livesinliminalspaces

I am a PhD candidate in the School of English, whose research focuses on the effect the urban environment and the cityscape has on the behaviour of marginalised characters in the novels from the Twentieth Century.